Dennis Carey – Executive Recruitment

By Dennis Carey

He was called a corporate raider in the ‘80s. He has succeeded in rehabilitating his image as an activist shareholder today and has become one of the most successful septuagenarians using the new media in a compelling blog. Surely, he can contribute in other ways in helping to solve some of the most challenging issues in these tough economic times.

I’m talking about Carl Icahn. He is an American success story: He grew up poor in Queens, was smart enough to garner an education at Princeton University, dropped out of medical school, joined the army and began his career on Wall Street more than 50 years ago. Now ranked No. 20 on the Forbes list of wealthiest Americans, Icahn is a product of capitalism and the American free enterprise system. He says he’s different from other businessmen in that he “made all this money and kept it.”

Now that Jerry Yang has agreed to step down as CEO of Yahoo, Mr. Icahn seems to have “won.” In addition, he was the featured Weekend Interview in The Wall Street Journal (11-15-2008) giving voice to a number of typically bold pronouncements. While such thoughts may make good headlines, they do not appear helpful in bringing greater understanding about what’s been occurring in the business world.

He characterizes CEOs of failed companies as being off playing golf all day and ignoring shareholders. He makes sweeping statements about his ability to go in and run a company and “save 30 percent in almost any company because there is so much waste and mismanagement.”
While his statements in the Journal article are not new, the placement seems to give more credence to some sweeping and generally negative statements about CEOs, boards and corporate governance and the sad state of business affairs.
He rails at the lack of accountability in the corporate world. And those who received severance packages in the face of Wall Street’s collapse are worse than Marie Antoinette who met her fate at the guillotine.

Given that so many small investors are mystified and devastated by the global macro developments that have erased almost a third of the value of almost every company traded on any exchange, is this the greatest value that someone of Mr. Icahn’s stature can deliver? What is the value in fueling more emotion over the misplaced disappointment and rage that every investor has suffered?

Mr. Icahn admits that these are difficult times. In fact, he says that he has never seen a downturn like this, noting the depression in the debt markets, which has created such difficulty for corporations to raise new money.

At 72, Mr. Icahn has a lot of experience to help us manage through this global financial crisis. Instead, he has decided that making headlines and setting himself up as the hero for “the little guy.”

At this juncture, the U.S. and global economy need all the help it can get, including help from Mr. Icahn.